


The Colour of Forgotten Places

by Inisheer



Series: Broken Things Can Be Repaired [2]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, give maggie sawyer a backstory 2k17
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-04
Updated: 2017-06-18
Packaged: 2018-11-08 22:55:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 19,363
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11091627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inisheer/pseuds/Inisheer
Summary: When a phone call brings news of a family bereavement, Alex and Maggie make the decision to travel to Nebraska. That's… Really not the best decision, guys.





	1. Ready

**Author's Note:**

> Content warnings for homophobia, emotional abuse, family death.
> 
> A follow-up to The Weight of Water, though it probably isn't necessary to read that first. Not that I'm discouraging you from reading my fics :)

This is how it ends.

Maggie has the window rolled down to catch the wind rustling through the cornfields. Everything is shaded in grey and black, including Maggie, including Alex’s own hands and the road rising into existence in front of their wheels and fading to nothing behind them. They’re nowhere. A bobcat crosses in a blink of yellow shining eyes, gone like a ghost story, and vanishes into another lifetime.

Music would make it feel less unreal, or less real, but Alex forgot when she started the car and now she’s not sure how to bring it up. They haven’t spoken much. Not at all, probably, since they passed the boundary of Blue Springs.

Until Maggie says, like she’s been thinking about it for a while, ‘Can we stop for a bit? Do we have time?’

Alex says, ‘Sure,’ before checking if it’s true. She pulls the car over in a patch of short grass. Her own breathing is suddenly loud in the absence of the engine, or any other sound. She flexes her fingers and waits. Waits a long time, in fact, minutes stretching out, until Alex thinks it might be an idea to prompt her girlfriend. ‘Are you okay?’

‘Did I do the right thing?’

‘Yes. I think you did. I’m proud of you.’

‘Of course you’d say that,’ says Maggie.

‘I mean it.’

‘I know.’

Maggie opens the door, and the night air rushes in as she steps out. Alex follows. Maggie hasn’t gone far, only to lean against the side of the vehicle, and Alex settles beside her. Their shoulders brush together. Alex thinks Maggie shifts in her direction, a little.

‘It’s a shame about the clouds. It’s beautiful on a clear night.’

‘I can imagine.’

‘You can hardly see any stars in National City.’

Alex nods. Stars, and the fields caught in the vista of starlight, no longer grey but silver. It must be something to behold. As it is, only the car’s lights provide faint illumination, and the world beyond might as well not exist. Any distant settlements lie out of sight beyond the low hills. It’s just the two of them, in the dark.

‘Do you know the constellations?’

‘The Big Dipper,’ says Maggie. ‘I can find the north star. Never bothered about the rest. Why – oh, I bet you know all of them, don’t you, Danvers?’

‘It’s Kara’s fault, actually,’ says Alex.

‘Right.’

‘You can see all the stars in Midvale, too.’

They’re quiet for a while. The wind is picking up: small flurries pass them, rippling in the half-grown corn, whispering secrets, and are gone. They’ll have to go soon as well. Alex doesn’t want to say it unless she has to.

‘Do you think we’ll ever come back?’ Maggie finally says.

‘Would it bother you if we didn’t?’

Maggie’s frowning. ‘I don’t think so,’ she says, and her tone is full of wonder.

Alex kisses her on the cheek. ‘Okay, then,’ she says, opening the passenger door for her girlfriend. ‘Now let’s go home.’

* 

This is how it begins. This is how it ends.

The kitchen could be any kitchen in any countless number of homes, and it could not be any other kitchen. No other kitchen has that precise inspirational quote framed in that precise position relative to the door. No other kitchen table carries these scratches from a small, bored child armed with a steak knife. No other kitchen cupboard has its spices and cans of soup arranged in quite the same way.

The kitchen could be any kitchen but it is, unquestionably, his kitchen.

Perhaps that’s a mercy.

The clock on the wall reads five minutes to eight. It will read five minutes to eight forever. It will read quarter past eight when the screaming starts.

The dishes have not been done.

* 

This is how it begins.

Alex Danvers returns from her run sweat-stained, dishevelled, and ready to collapse back into bed. It’s summer in National City: scorching even with a sea breeze funnelling up the bay, and perilous for exercise once the sun rises. Going back to bed is not an option – Maggie won’t let her get within six feet in these clothes, and she has to go to work today – so Alex tiptoes through the bedroom to retrieve her clean clothes and heads into the shower.

The water’s almost up to temperature when a noise catches her attention. Alex slams the shower off – listens – swears under her breath – grabs a towel and darts for the main room, where she catches the phone before it can make too much noise. It’s only _after_ she’s answered it with a curt, ‘Hello?’ and a wavering voice on the other end has said, ‘I’m sorry, maybe I’ve got the wrong number. Is – is Maggie there?’ – only then that Alex realises what she’s done.

Oh, well. Maggie won’t mind.

‘Maggie Sawyer? It’s the right number. She’s still in bed. Can I take a message?’

‘No, I really need to speak to Maggie, please,’ says the voice. Female. Older, at a guess. Definitely Midwestern.

‘Who is this?’

‘It’s Bella Sawyer. I’m her mother. Are you going to let me speak to her now?’

Maggie’s _mom_? At seven in the morning? That means it’s something important. And the tenor of Bella Sawyer’s voice, under the rudeness, makes Alex think it’s something important too. So she wraps the towel more firmly around herself, makes placatory noises, and heads for the bedroom to rouse her girlfriend.

‘Babe? Your mom’s on the phone. She wants to speak to you. I’m sorry to wake you up, but it sounds urgent. Here.’

Maggie squints at her through usual pre-coffee grogginess. ‘What’s it about?’

‘She wouldn’t tell me.’

Maggie holds out her hand for the phone.

Alex perches on the bed beside her. For long moments Maggie doesn’t say anything. When she does, it’s, ‘Oh,’ and, ‘Okay,’ and, ‘Of course,’ and Alex can’t hear what the sombre voice on the other end is telling her and Maggie gives nothing away. After about five minutes she clicks the phone off, puts it down, and stares into nothing.

Alex instinctively puts an arm around her, but Maggie is stiff and unreachable. ‘Sweetie, what is it? What’s happened?’ It takes three repeats of the question, finally accompanied with a little shake, before Maggie answers.

‘My dad’s dead,’ she says. She turns to Alex: ‘Have you had breakfast?’

‘Have I what?’

Alex watches in confusion as Maggie gets up and heads out of the room. It takes her a moment to think through what’s happening; then she starts, and hurries after Maggie, who is staring at the hob with a lost frown.

‘Babe. Just take a minute,’ says Alex, gently guiding her away and towards the sofa. ‘What did your mom say?’

‘He.’ It’s clearly an effort for Maggie to focus. She needs coffee, or something stronger. ‘He had a heart attack. Last night. She was at her ladies’ church meeting and when she got back she found him on the floor. Maybe she was praying for it. Oh, Lord, deliver me from my husband, and the Lord answered, and it was done.’

‘Oh my god.’

‘I don’t know if I’m glad he’s dead or if I – I don’t know. I can’t think.’ Maggie presses her fingers to the bridge of her nose and breathes shakily. ‘The funeral’s on Saturday.’

Funeral. Alex is familiar with those. Half-forgotten relatives in black, flitting around like crows, _I’m sorry for your loss._ At least the Sawyers will have a body to bury. ‘Do you want to go?’

It’s clearly not an easy question to answer.

After a long while with no reply, Alex decides to make Maggie coffee, stronger than usual, and receives a vague nod when she hands it over. ‘Go have your shower, babe,’ Maggie says, sounding like she’s on another planet again.

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yeah.’

‘I can stay here for a bit –’

‘Danvers, I’m okay.’

This is blatantly untrue, but if Maggie wants space then that’s what Alex should give her, and the world hasn’t stopped for one man’s death. So Alex goes. When she emerges there is toast and yogurt on the counter and Maggie looks more like herself, though also like she’s been crying. Alex runs a hand across her shoulder before sitting down. ‘Hey.’

‘Hey.’ Maggie passes her the orange juice.

‘You come to any decisions?’

Maggie nods slowly. She takes a bite of (dry) toast. ‘I’m going to the funeral.’ When Alex doesn’t immediately protest this, she continues: ‘It’s not that I don’t expect it to be horrible. It will be. But I need to see for myself that he’s really gone. And if I don’t go my mom will never forgive me.’ It must show on Alex’s face, that this is hardly a loss given they hadn’t spoken in five years until today, because Maggie adds, ‘She’s not as bad as he is. _Was._ I keep forgetting.’

‘It’s hard,’ says Alex. She can’t think what else to say. What do you say, when someone dies? All the words she can come up with seem like wasted breath. Maybe that’s what poetry’s for, though Alex has never really been a fan. _I’m so sorry for your loss._ She’s not sure Maggie considers it one. But it doesn’t look like she thinks of it as victory, either.

‘When will you go?’ she asks instead.

She’s expecting the answer to be _as late as possible_. But Maggie picks at the crumbs on her plate and says, ‘Today. Mom needs help organising things. She says my brothers aren’t likely to be much use.’

‘Right.’

‘I know it’s not fair of me to ask this,’ says Maggie, slowly. ‘You’ve got work, and you shouldn’t have to subject yourself to my family, but – it would really mean a lot to me if –’

‘Maggie. Of course I’ll come.’

‘Oh.’ Then: ‘Thank you.’

Maggie’s eyes are red. Alex moves around the counter to be beside her and wipes the tears away with her thumbs, lets Maggie sniffle into her DEO shirt, which it doesn’t look like she’s going to need today, and kisses her hair. ‘Shh, babe. I’m here. I’m here.’

‘I’m not crying for him,’ says Maggie, muffled by the fabric. ‘I hated him.’

‘I know.’

‘I should dance on his grave.’

‘Maybe you’ll get to,’ says Alex, which provokes something between a laugh and a sob – but mostly a sob – and Alex squeezes back her own tears, cursing fate or luck or whichever god they’ve unknowingly pissed off for making Maggie’s life hard all over again, as if alien invasions and near-drownings weren’t enough.

Funny to think, half an hour ago she believed this was going to be a good day.

* 

Maggie can get a couple of days on bereavement leave. Alex has to claim her under-used time off. She explains the situation to J’onn, who sounds so unfussed he almost makes her feel foolish for apologising. She knows the DEO can survive perfectly well without her. It’s been a quiet month: apparently even criminal aliens and masterminds take a break in the summer heat. They’ve been making no progress tracking down Cadmus, and – but Alex’s own dad is not the priority right now.

‘I completely understand,’ says J’onn. ‘Give my condolences to Detective Sawyer.’

It occurs to Alex he has no idea about Maggie’s relationship with her parents. Nor does Kara, or anyone else she knows of in National City.

She gives the condolences. Maggie laughs bitterly.

The next call is to Kara. Alex catches her mid-flight, as she can tell from the distinctive rushing in the background, and it takes some fast talking to prevent Kara from flying right to them. The phone gets handed to Maggie and Alex tosses underwear into a borrowed suitcase, half-listening.

‘I’m all right, Kara, you don’t need to worry about me.’ A pause. ‘And I’m grateful. But I’ll be fine, honestly. I’ve got Alex.’ Whatever Kara says in reply makes Maggie snort in amusement. ‘Yeah, she is. Yes, Kara, if we need anything we know exactly who to call.’

When she hangs up, Alex asks, ‘Do I want to know?’

‘It would just go to your head, Danvers.’

Alex tosses a shirt at Maggie. There are a surprising number of her things here; or an unsurprising number, if she’s honest with herself, but more than she’d managed to keep track of. How did Maggie end up with her favourite tweezers? With one of Maggie’s suitcases in hand, all Alex needs to pick up from her own apartment when they swing past it is funeral-appropriate attire.

Surprisingly soon they find themselves luxuriating in coach in the sky over Colorado.

After waving off the flight attendants’ final round with the trolley, and shortly before the plane starts its descent, Maggie says, ‘It’s not that I don’t believe it.’

‘But?’ says Alex.

Maggie shrugs. ‘He was only fifty-eight.’

*

‘Is it your first time in Kansas City?’ the girl asks, while they’re waiting for the computer to finish processing the car-hire documents.

They both shake their heads. Alex is sure she’s passed through the city once or twice, on DEO business. She doesn’t know how many times Maggie’s been, though it’s clear she’s familiar with the airport, and it’s a sensible way in to her part of Nebraska – though Alex can’t say who she would have been visiting there, since she left. It will be Alex’s first time in the state: she’s visited thirty-six states, but Nebraska is not one of them.

The computer makes a happy noise and the girl hands her a set of car keys, accompanied by rapid-fire directions around the parking lot.

They step out of the airport into burnished light. Small birds swoop across the heat-shimmering tarmac in daredevil slaloms, between rows of glinting silver cars; theirs is easy enough to find, neat, dull. Maggie drives, up the interstate, then turning off onto smaller roads: little more than strips of grey and white painted over the dusty ground. They pass through vast fields of corn, broken by occasional herds of many-coloured cattle and patches of woodland. Purple flowers spring up by the side of the road. It’s a few hours’ drive to Blue Springs-and-Wymore and they reach it in the early afternoon. Only the river snaking past it on the Satnav’s map is actually blue: the buildings of the town itself are mostly cream, fawn-coloured, terracotta and blinding white, built on a sea of lush green lawns cut into neat grids. The one hotel between the two towns has a vacancies sign up, and they park in relief.

It’s the kind of place that might be described as _quaint_ : real wood interiors and landscape paintings on the walls. The clerk looks down his nose at them, pauses his typing as they approach. Alex, refusing to let herself be intimidated, explains that they’d like a room for three nights. The man looks between them, his expression darkening.

‘You want a double room?’

She thought she’d said it clearly enough. ‘Yes.’

‘I’m sorry, but we don’t have any vacancies.’

‘What? That’s not what it said outside.’

The man coughs. ‘That must have been a mistake. I’m terribly sorry.’ He doesn’t sound it, and realisation hits Alex like a speeding train. At the same time, Maggie tugs at her arm.

‘Come on, Alex. It’s okay. We’ll go somewhere else.’

No. It’s not okay, not in the slightest. Nobody has ever – and it’s such a _belittling_ lie, like they must be stupid enough to believe it. But there’s no answer to it, no way to respond without escalating the situation, and much as she’d like to Alex can’t exactly start punching civilians in the middle of Nebraska for being homophobic.

What really hurts is Maggie’s defeated look. If someone in National City did that, Alex knows, she’d yell at them. But if someone in National City did that, she’d have people on her side. Maybe not everybody here is as vile as the clerk but he clearly believes he can get away with it; and he’s right, too, that’s the most infuriating part. There’s little for them to do except slump in the car and discuss their other options.

This is what people are like. Alex knows that, but it slips her mind. There’s never been any trouble in National City. Maggie probably doesn’t forget. She doesn’t look _surprised._ But she’s drawn into herself, hunched over the wheel.

‘We could go up to Beatrice,’ says Alex, checking the map. ‘It’s only fifteen miles.’ She’s sick of driving, but Beatrice at least half-resembles a proper city: somewhere they’re likely to find a motel that couldn’t care less who they are as long as they pay the bill, if not somewhere they’d feel safe holding hands on the street. Though Alex doesn’t necessarily think of that as a reason not to. She wonders if Maggie would.

‘We might as well stop in and see my mom first. Her house is less than five minutes away.’

‘Is that a good idea?’ It’s Maggie herself who said they should probably get settled in and take a breather before dealing with her family.

Maggie spreads her hands. ‘Well, I don’t know, Alex. Coming here in the first place was a bad idea. What’s another one?’

‘All right.’

Soon they park by a white house, two stories high, and screened from the road by a couple of trees probably twice its age. Their knock is answered by an older woman, with greying hair pulled back in a bun and – unsettlingly – Maggie’s eyes, though minus the warmth. They narrow as she looks between them. ‘Maggie. You didn’t tell me you were bringing anyone.’

Alex glances at Maggie; but her girlfriend looks confused, not guilty. ‘I did, Mom, I messaged you about it.’ She shakes herself. ‘Mom, this is Alex. My girlfriend.’

‘Nice to meet you,’ says Alex.

Bella Sawyer doesn’t return the greeting. ‘Well, I suppose you’d better come in.’

It’s the kind of house that is not only spotless, but so determinedly so that this is the first noticeable thing about it. There’s a faint air of frenzy to its scrupulous neatness, and the living room has clearly been redone in the past couple of years, by someone who must have read about interior design in books but not quite mastered their lessons: the cream walls, brown accents and grey-leather sofa set feel just a _little_ off.

Maggie blinks in surprise, murmuring something about redecorating, and Alex almost reaches for her hand but she doesn’t want to find out, against the sight of Bella’s pursed lips, that Maggie will pull away.

Photos adorn the walls and mantelpiece. Maggie’s in them, as a little girl with the same dark hair and dimples she has now, bedecked in decidedly un-Maggie-like dresses. (It’s not that Maggie doesn’t wear dresses, just that Alex can’t imagine her ever willingly wearing these ones. There’s a general surplus of ribbons and frills. Even Kara would find them too cutesy.) Maggie disappears from the photos long before her teens, while her brothers continue to grow up: the boys who must be Michael and Matthew are recorded from shapeless blobs in christening gowns to smiling young men; in two sets of high school graduation pictures and a single set of college ones. But no picture of Maggie past about ten.

Alex spots a blue sneaker with frayed laces poking out from behind the chair she selects. That’s odd. It’s the one thing she can see that’s out of place.

‘How are you holding up, Mom?’ Maggie asks, in that gentle way she’s so good at, with the head-tilt and the smile.

Bella shrugs. ‘I’m coping. It’s all a shock, of course, he was in wonderful health…’

‘Have you got people helping you? What about Matthew?’

‘Oh, yes, Matthew’s been… Helping. Of course he’s had to deal with all the diner stuff. I’ve got a fridge full of casseroles from the girls at church, you know what they’re like, and Tina Monaghan _insisted_ I have lunch at hers, so I had to listen to her blabber on about that hotshot son of hers getting into medical school.’ Bella pauses. ‘I’m going to miss your father a great deal, but I trust that he’s in a good place, looking down on us all. Will you be staying for dinner?’

There’s a rustle from behind Alex. She listens more carefully. Huh.

‘We were planning to come back, but we can’t stay long for now. We still need to go up to Beatrice to find a hotel.’

‘Why aren’t you staying in the one in Wymore?’

Alex and Maggie share an uneasy look. ‘They didn’t want our business,’ Alex says.

Bella nods vaguely. ‘Beatrice is a bit of a drive,’ she says.

‘It’s only fifteen miles –’ Alex starts to reply.

Bella continues over the top, ‘And I hate to think of you forking out money for a hotel.’ (This is directed at Maggie, not at both of them.) ‘You’re welcome to stay here.’

They hold a silent consultation. Maggie looks keen, pleased, like she can’t believe her luck. Alex is starting to wonder what Bella’s playing at; but that sounds like paranoia even as she thinks it to herself, and saving money on a hotel room _is_ appealing, and she doesn’t want to risk a repeat of the place in Wymore. So she says, ‘Up to you.’

Maggie gives her mom a nod.

‘Great!’ Bella’s manner instantly turns officious. ‘Michael will have his own room and Laura’s sleeping in Matthew’s, so Alex can have the fold-out bed in the living room and you can put the air-bed in Matthew’s room with Laura –’

‘What? No. I can sleep on the fold-out bed with Alex, down here.’

‘But that’s…’

Eminently reasonable, Alex thinks, given they’ve been sleeping together – in any sense of the word – for months. That particular horse has long since fled the stable and crossed the border into Canada. Unless Bella thinks it’s different if the sin happens under her own roof? But that doesn’t seem to be her objection; she doesn’t seem to have any solid objection.

Come to think of it – there’s work, obviously, but Alex can’t recall the last time the last time they simply decided to spend a night apart. It would be too weird to fall asleep without Maggie’s breath in her ears, her weight at the other side of the bed, her unfailing attempts to steal the covers. Particularly here.

She’s glad to realise Maggie has the same idea. ‘Mom, listen to me. Alex is my girlfriend. It’s really a bit late to worry about us sharing a bed.’

Bella hesitates, like she’s on the verge of arguing. ‘It was only a suggestion, Maggie.’ The smile which now spreads across her face is plastic and hollow. ‘You and your girlfriend are both grown adults. I suppose I can’t stop you.’

There’s a slight hitch on “girlfriend” and Maggie must have noticed, Maggie always notices things like that, but she doesn’t pursue it. ‘Exactly.’

There’s a moment like a pivot, weighted, mother and daughter eyeing each other up. Bella breaks it by slapping her hands on her knees with a hearty, forced laugh. ‘In that case I’d better see if I can find the sheets,’ she says, and bustles out of the room. As soon as she’s gone Alex scoots across to join Maggie on the sofa. Maggie breathes out sharply and reaches up to touch Alex’s face.

‘I’m sorry, love, I know she’s – we can still go to Beatrice, if you’d prefer.’

‘It’s okay.’ Alex kisses her palm, takes Maggie’s hand in her own. ‘I’d tell you if I wasn’t happy. You _know_ that.’

‘What did I do to deserve you?’

‘Do you want the whole list?’ she says, and Maggie snorts. Quietly, Alex continues, ‘It’s totally okay if you feel like you need to be here for her. She’s still your mom, and he was still your dad.’

Maggie’s eyes shutter a little at this, but she nods. ‘Yeah.’ Sighs. ‘I’d better go and help.’ She kisses Alex quickly – ‘I love you.’

‘Love you too,’ says Alex, and lets Maggie go.

There’s that rustling again. Alex goes and leans over the back of the chair. The black lab gazes up at her, frozen in place. Now _that_ is a guilty expression. The companion to the first sneaker sits between the dog’s paws.

‘There’s not a lot of protein in rubber,’ Alex remarks, and gets a small whine in response. That’s when Bella returns with a bundle of pillows, sees Alex, notices the dog, and starts shouting.

‘Put that down! Get out of here!’

‘That won’t help, Mom,’ says Maggie, right behind her. ‘You’ll just scare – them.’

‘Well, I wouldn’t know, would I? They were your dad’s pets,’ Bella snaps.

Maggie dumps the sheets she’s carrying and crouches beside the chair. The lab’s ears have gone back, tail flat to the ground, and Maggie keeps a respectful distance while saying – in a soothing tone Alex assumes is meant for the dog and not the mother – ‘It’s not that complicated. You’ve got to feed them, water them, let them outside…’

‘Obviously. I’m not an idiot.’

‘… And take them for walks and pay attention to them,’ Maggie finishes. The dog’s ears have pricked up. Maggie pries the shoe out of its mouth. ‘Yes, you understand _walk_ , don’t you? Good dog.’

Bella mutters something about never asking to be responsible for them. ‘Maggie, you can handle the fold-out. I’m going to get started on dinner. I’m sure I can make it stretch to four.’ She stalks into the kitchen and chases out a second labrador, this one chocolate. ‘That’s Violet. And that’s Daisy,’ she says, pointing to the shoe thief, before closing the door.

Oh, well. It could have gone worse.

*

Maggie’s aunt, Laura, arrives just before dinner is served. She’s _the_ aunt, the woman who somehow managed to retain a semblance of a relationship with her relatives after taking in the lesbian niece they’d thrown out. Five years Bella’s senior but less grey-haired (except at the roots), she greets Maggie with a stiff hug, then turns and says, ‘You must be Alex.’ She tilts her head. ‘What is it you do again?’

‘I’m in the FBI.’ Alex almost feels like there should be a “ma’am” at the end of that sentence.

‘Hmph. I’m sure you two make quite a pair. But I suppose you’ll do.’

Dinner, though late, is a full meal of the kind Alex only expects at Thanksgiving and Christmas: roast beef, roast potatoes, heaped bowls of steaming vegetable sides. (Suddenly the heart attack seems less mysterious, if Maggie’s dad ate like this every day. Does her mom not work?) Maggie glares at the potatoes over the words “goose fat” and claims ownership of the bread rolls, while Laura grills her about her work.

They’ve all got glasses of wine – for once, Alex isn’t the one responsible for emptying it at a family gathering; she’s not certain who is, but by dessert Bella has moved onto the port, and she begins to well up over her recently-late husband. ‘I keep expecting him to walk in the door,’ she says. ‘The man could be an asshole sometimes, God knows, but he was always so good to me, he was such a good man.’ There’s a sniffle.

Maggie’s expression is a picture. Fortunately, Bella is in too much of a state to notice. ‘He loved all you kids so much. He never recovered from what you did, Maggie, from the way you left.’

‘I didn’t _leave_ , Mom, he threw me out –’

‘Children have no idea how much the things they do can hurt their parents.’

Laura cuts in, before Maggie can respond, ‘Now, Bella. That was all a long time ago. Richard’s in a better place now. You’re going to miss him very much, aren’t you?’

Maggie’s nails might be blunt but her fingers still hurt where they dig into Alex’s knee. Between Bella’s sobs, Alex jumps up with the offer to clear the table. Bella has her head in her hands; Laura, with a hand on her sister’s back, nods urgently. Alex grabs an armful of dishes and heads out, and Maggie, to her relief, follows her.

In the kitchen, though, she freezes. Alex eases the plates from her grasp in the sudden fear she’ll drop them. ‘Maggie? Sweetie?’

‘This is where he died.’

‘Oh.’ Alex tugs Maggie round so she can draw her close, arms around Maggie’s waist, chin on her shoulder.

‘I guess a part of me always thought.’

‘What?’

‘Nothing,’ says Maggie. She disentangles herself and looks at Alex squarely. ‘Nothing.’

‘It’ll be okay. Your mom, she…’ She deserves a good shake, honestly, but Alex can hardly say that. She’ll come around? She’s just lost her husband? She’s drunk? Alex doesn’t feel generous enough to offer Bella Sawyer any excuses.

‘Yeah,’ says Maggie.

By the time they’ve finished cleaning up, the mood has calmed a little. ‘Why don’t we go through to the other room?’ Laura is saying when Alex returns for the empty wine bottles. ‘We’ll all be more comfortable in there.’

‘Haven’t you heard? Maggie and her girlfriend have got the other room.’

‘I’m sure we can make it work,’ says Laura, hoisting her sister up by the armpits.

In the living room Alex sits cross-legged on the sofa-bed with Maggie beside her, holding hands loosely. Bella and Laura take the chairs. Laura soon has Violet’s head wedged into her lap and she strokes the dog absently through the meandering conversation. It’s warm and getting late, and the day started early; for Alex, tiredness is more of an ache in her bones, but she can tell Maggie is growing sleepy and she’s not surprised when her girlfriend slumps against her side.

She sits up sharpish again when Bella says, ‘You don’t need to make such an exhibition of yourself.’

‘We’re not exactly acting out the kama sutra here, Mom.’

Laura claps her hands together and stands up, displacing an aggrieved Violet. ‘It’s late enough. We should all think about getting to bed.’

‘No, Michael’s coming tonight. I want to wait up for him.’ Bella’s speaking now with an edge of careful over-enunciation.

‘It’s almost midnight,’ says Laura. ‘Go on, sweetheart. He’ll get here when he gets here.’

Bella thinks about this; it looks difficult, through the wine-haze. Laura continues to cajole her and she finally says, ‘Yes. All right.’ She gives them a curt, ‘Goodnight,’ and wobbles from the room.

‘And you,’ says Laura, turning to Maggie. ‘You need to be nice to your mother. It’s not an easy time for her, and you know she’s never been able to accept your – lifestyle.’

‘My _life_ , Tia,’ says Maggie.

‘Of course. That’s what I meant.’ Laura rubs her hands across her face. ‘And it’s not easy for you either. But you’ve been so strong about everything so far, and your mom and your brothers are going to need you to keep that up.’ She smiles. ‘Sleep well. And you, Alex.’

Alex isn’t sure how easily sleep will come, fifteen hundred miles from home, in a strange bed, in a strange room never intended for a bedroom and cast in the distinctive odd shadows of a streetlamp shining through paper-thin blinds. The house falls quiet as people finish up their evening routine. Maggie’s mom, her dad, her aunt, her no-show brother: Alex would rather face down aliens. She thinks about calling Kara, or even her mom, both of them likely to still be awake in the California evening – both of them who seem to love her far more than she’s ever earned; who would, if she rocked up with a dead body, simply shake their heads and offer to help her bury it; who didn’t say a word against her when she came out, not only because they loved her, but because they understood there was nothing wrong. They’d listen.

But if she talks about it she’ll have to admit to herself how bad it is: how angry she feels on Maggie’s behalf, how helpless she is to make things better, how much the hotel clerk’s tone and Bella Sawyer’s expression felt like an assault on some deep part of her person she didn’t know was exposed. If she talks about it Alex doubts she’ll make it through the weekend, and Maggie needs her to do that, and everything is ten times worse for her.

Once they’ve changed and crawled under the sheets Alex curls around Maggie, and listens to her breathing slow, and counts down the hours till home.


	2. Or

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings for homophobia, emotional abuse, family death.
> 
> And I forgot to mention last time: "Laura" is pronounced "LOW-ra", as in Spanish, rather than the English "LAW-ra".

Alex wakes early, having slept badly, and pulls the sheets over her head to block out the light. Beside her Maggie tosses, turns, tosses again, and finally lands flat on her back with an ‘umph’. Alex pokes her head out and blinks at her.

‘You awake, babe?’

‘Does this mattress feel particularly lumpy to you?’

There’s no hope of getting back to sleep. It’s morning, if a hellish hour of such, and Alex knows her body thinks it’s had enough rest. (Her brain disagrees.) She pads upstairs to the main bathroom, where she spends about thirty seconds fighting with the jammed lock and glares at the bags under her eyes as if this will make them go away.

By the time she returns, Maggie has sat up and is staring towards the kitchen door with a thoughtful look. Scratching emanates from behind it. The dogs have been locked in all night, and _they_ clearly think it’s morning.

‘I’ve got an idea,’ says Maggie. ‘There’s somewhere I’d like to show you.’

This is how Alex finds herself, not long after sunrise, loading two labradors into the back of a rental car she earnestly hopes they won’t ruin. They drive out in the shining morning, heading upriver from Blue Springs; through Beatrice, where they pick up breakfast and second rounds of coffee from a block-colour drive-through, and out from the city to a gladed wood-chip picnic area by the river’s edge. The dogs leap out with wild abandon and turn into rustling patches in the undergrowth.

Alex sits on the edge of the trunk, inspecting the damage inside – passable – and sips her coffee. ‘It’s lovely, babe, but how’s it any different from Blue Springs?’

‘Because.’ Maggie points. ‘My aunt’s old house is just half a mile that way. This is where I used to come when I lived with her.’ She whistles for the dogs and they come bounding back. ‘When I needed to get out of the house, I’d cycle down, start about here, and just see how far I could go.’

‘How far was that?’

‘I made it to Wilbur a couple of times.’ Maggie shakes her head. ‘You don’t know where that is. If you go up the seventy-seven you get to Lincoln. About forty miles. Did that a few times too.’

The picnic space curves out of sight as they amble along the muddy track. The dogs sometimes trot by their side and sometimes race ahead, ears and tails and jaws flapping in the wind. Sometimes the fields open out, and Alex taps her hand along a fence dividing them from knee-high crops or tan cows, but always the trees soon close in on them. They’re only a narrow strip but from the inside they close out the world, creating a space that not only looks green but feels it; it’s pervaded by a dewy, heavy air reminiscent of a slice of rainforest. The plants are flourishing – sometimes as delicate flowers and great spreading trees, sometimes as strangling vines and creepers they find themselves stamping over – and black flies loop in lazy circles over the sluggish water.

They pass a tyre swing hung from a jutting branch, and Maggie stops, smiling softly. ‘I knew the kids who put that there.’

‘Friends of yours?’

‘Not exactly.’ They continue on. ‘Though the tyre’s probably been replaced since then. And the rope.’

There are other dog-walkers around, one every couple of minutes. Apart from that it’s quiet. Still early. The sky’s full of the kind of wispy clouds that look like half-spun cotton candy, shading out the glare of the low sun. Alex doesn’t know if it’s the place or the rhythm of the walk that encourages Maggie to start talking.

‘I didn’t always hate him. He could be good sometimes.’ She gestures to Daisy, trotting along beside them with her tail held high. Violet is hunting for squirrels among the trees. ‘He was good to animals. He said they were just dumb beasts, that you couldn’t hold them to the same standards as humans.’

‘He held you to high standards?’

‘Yeah. He shouted a lot. But…’ She spreads her hands. ‘He taught me to ride a bike, to swim, he did all the Dad Stuff. I used to love hanging out at the diner in summer, when I was in middle school. I’d waitress and I used to feel so proud when he told me I’d done a good job… Sounds stupid, doesn’t it?’

‘No. I don’t think so.’

The river loops, bringing them to a shallow gravel beach. Maggie tosses a couple of branches into the water and the dogs race after them, in a flurry of splashing water and startled ducks.

‘Did you know how he felt about gay people?’ says Alex.

‘Yeah. I knew he hated them.’ Maggie pulls the stick from Daisy’s jaws and flings it again. ‘I guess I never realised it meant he would hate _me._ ’

There’s nothing really to say to that. Alex rubs Maggie’s shoulder.

And then Maggie _laughs_ , truly and properly laughs, not something wry or angry but in surprised delight; and Alex is too busy staring at her to see why, until Maggie directs her attention with, ‘Danvers, look at that.’

Alex looks.

Violet is clearly very pleased with herself. And well she should be: that’s not the stick Maggie threw but one three times its length, longer than Violet herself – it’s practically a small tree. Daisy bounces out of the water beside her and shakes herself out, then grabs one of the trailing ends of the stick.

Maggie buries her head in Alex’s shoulder. It’s impossible not to laugh.

Daisy and Violet are sleek, well-cared-for, clearly happy animals. Bella’s not to credit for that, which means Maggie’s dad must have loved those dogs. Alex imagines him with a much younger Maggie – the little girl in flowery dresses and ribbons, no doubt pouting at being made to wear them – or perhaps there had been more suitable clothes for tramping through fields, with different dogs, long ago.

In another world (and Alex knows a little about other worlds) there may be a Maggie Sawyer whose parents accepted her. Perhaps, somehow, she and Alex have met anyway. They travel out to Nebraska and another Richard Sawyer takes Alex for a walk and asks her a hundred questions to see if she’s good enough for his daughter. Another Bella Sawyer has a smile that reaches her eyes. There are already so many real betrayals. What kind of people –

She doesn’t want to follow that thought. She’s not so naïve.

Violet has won the fight for the stick and promptly dropped it. She sits, calmer, tongue lolling in breathy pants. Daisy rolls on her back in the mud.

Maggie must notice that Alex’s laughter has faded. She gives her a quizzical look, and says, ‘Hey. What time is it?’

Time to head back, is the answer. Back past the ducks, past the bracken trying to colonise the path, past the old tyre swing. When they get to the car they dig out towels to rub down the dogs and clean the mud as best they can from their own shoes.

It’s nothing – ‘Hand me that towel, babe?’ – but Alex hears a door slam, sees a woman next to a car two spaces down, white knuckles wrapped around a little yappy terrier’s leash, throwing them an utterly filthy look. Maggie glances round and back to Alex, shoulders heaving, more tired-looking than distraught.

‘I’m getting a bit sick of that,’ Alex says, when the woman’s gone, when there’s nobody in sight and shouldn’t be anyone within earshot. Violet’s wagging tail thwacks against her arm.

‘I’m sorry. I should have warned you.’

‘Maggie, we’ve talked about this. I’m a big girl, you don’t get to protect me.’

‘No, I know. But I should have _warned_ you. That wasn’t fair.’

Alex shrugs. ‘You had other things on your mind. It’s not like you’ve never told me what it was like here.’ Violet is as mud-free as she’s going to get, and whining pitifully at the trunk, which Daisy has already hopped into. Alex hoists the labrador up. ‘And you grew up with it. I wish you hadn’t had to go through that.’

‘That makes two of us, Danvers.’

*

By the time they get back, Bella and Laura are both up, though they haven’t been for long judging by the massive bowl of cornflakes Laura continues to mildly spoon into her mouth while Bella says, ‘Where have you been?’

It’s fairly obvious where they’ve been, given Maggie has just released the dogs back into the kitchen. They start to rough-house playfully over the water bowl. Maggie says, ‘Didn’t you see my note?’ and Bella huffs. She’s wearing a lot of make-up, particularly around the eyes, but it’s still possible to discern the puffiness underneath. ‘It’s okay, Mom.’

‘If you say so.’

There’s no sign of Michael, and Bella is alone in seeming surprised by this; but Maggie’s other brother, Matthew, shows up not much later in a beaten-up Chevy Spark.

He’s a plump young man. Clearly a Sawyer – same nose, same jaw – and not tall, though not as small as Alex initially thinks: he’s close enough to her own height. But Matthew gives off an impression of smallness just as Maggie, with the confident way she carries herself through the world, often seems taller than she is.

Judging by Bella’s greeting, Matthew is the beloved child, to be smothered in hugs and kisses until he awkwardly pushes his mother away. Alex and Maggie watch through the doorway, over the local newspaper they’ve borrowed to learn what the breaking news is in Nebraska. Matthew turns into the living room and freezes.

‘Maggie and her girlfriend are here,’ Bella half-whispers. ‘They couldn’t find a hotel. Are you two ready to go?’

Maggie nods, then turns her attention to her little brother. ‘Hi, Matthew.’

Maggie’s brother folds his arms. He opens his mouth, closes it again, and eventually all he says is, ‘Hi, Maggie.’

‘You sound happy to see me.’ He looks it, too, with the clenched jaw and the skittering eyes.

‘Mom wanted you here, so I’m glad you came,’ he says, slowly. ‘But you’ve got some nerve, sitting there waving your fa- sitting there all over each other, in – in Dad’s house.’

Maggie bristles. She says, ‘We’re not _all over each other_.’ Her hand rests lightly on Alex’s leg, where it tends to drift when they’re together. Apart from that they’re hardly touching. Maggie shifts her hand further up Alex’s leg, from her knee to her thigh. ‘What were you going to call us?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Yeah? Did you learn _nothing_ in church or on Reddit?’ Her hand moves higher. There’s now an honest case to be made that it’s bordering on indecent; and, though Alex knows it’s _so_ not the time, it’s having a certain effect on her. They haven’t had sex since – is it only Wednesday? Feels longer.

‘Maggie! Stop it!’ Bella snaps. Maggie snorts and withdraws her hand. ‘As for you – this was never just your dad’s house. Maggie and her girlfriend are my guests, and you will be polite to them. Now go and say hello to your aunt.’

Matthew tosses his head and scurries off for the kitchen. Bella dithers. ‘He has a point. I know you two are – together – but could you try to keep it in the bedroom?’

Right now, they don’t _have_ a bedroom. Until a minute ago they were alone. And Matthew doesn’t have a goddamn point, unless reading a newspaper with someone has been upgraded from its traditional G rating since the last time Alex checked.

And. In the ringing silence that follows, it truly registers with Alex that she just said all of that out loud. To her girlfriend’s mother.

‘ _Alex_ ,’ says Maggie. It’s a warning. ‘Chill.’

It stings. Alex runs through her instinctive responses in her head and hears the controlling girlfriend in all of them: the woman who thinks she has a right to walk into someone’s home and start insulting their family. No. You don’t do that. But she can’t bring herself to apologise either. She says, ‘Maggie,’ and it’s almost a plea.

Maggie half-smiles. ‘Maybe you should stay here today.’

‘Fine,’ says Alex, trying to make it sound like she means it.

When Bella’s out of earshot, Alex says, ‘Are you going to be okay?’

‘Mom will make Matthew behave himself.’

‘Right. And what about her?’

Maggie breathes out, long and slow. ‘She’s trying her best, sweetie.’ She goes in for a kiss and Alex turns her head away, lets Maggie plant it softly on her cheek instead. Maggie lingers with her forehead inches from Alex’s temple. ‘Alex.’

‘Call me if they give you any trouble, okay?’

‘Okay.’

As Maggie leaves, Alex slumps backwards onto the bed. How many hours, how many minutes? She runs the calculations in her head, like she used to before Christmas, and feels a little less lost. Though it’s not so much like waiting for Christmas, because she can’t simply wait it out: she’s got to go through it. It’s more like an exam. One with no marking scheme, no revision, no option to resit, and the questions are all in code.

Life, basically. 

*

It takes her twenty minutes or so to finish the newspaper and fire off replies to a few messages. Alex assumes she’s alone until she heads through to the kitchen, and jumps to see Laura at the kitchen table.

She needs to get herself together. That kind of slip isn’t okay, even here.

Laura, unruffled, says, ‘Hello, dear. Do you have any idea who the longest-serving French president was?’

‘Um.’ Alex quickly composes herself. ‘Chirac? No, Mitterrand.’

‘Yes, that fits.’

‘You didn’t go to the undertaker’s?’ says Alex, heading towards the tap to fetch herself a glass of water.

‘He wasn’t _my_ husband. Thank the Lord.’

Alex laughs. ‘You wouldn’t say that in front of the Sawyers.’

‘They’re not here.’ Laura holds her gaze, and Alex understands perfectly well what the stern look means. ‘I may not have liked my sister’s husband and I may not be impressed by her behaviour now, grieving or not. But now’s not the time to go picking arguments, and you already know that, don’t you?’

Alex nods. Yeah, whatever. She knows.

She’s already over her outburst at Bella, who she’s beginning to expect these things from. What Maggie did hurts more: leaving her behind like a disobedient child to be placed in time out; like she isn’t needed. And maybe she isn’t – Maggie’s strong – but Alex thought she _wanted_ her there.

But Maggie is grieving too.

The water eddies into the glass, a vortex of vanishing bubbles, as clear as the water in the river was green. It tastes of metal. Alex sits down opposite Laura and her crossword. They’ve barely spoken to each other until now. Last night, Laura wasn’t exactly Alex’s chief concern, or vice versa. She watches Laura puzzle over another clue.

‘What was he like? Maggie’s dad?’

Laura taps the pen against the paper, then puts it down. She folds her hands together. ‘Richard was – unyielding, you could say. He had his views, and if you didn’t agree with them, he wasn’t a pleasant man to be around.’

‘He threw his daughter out when she was fourteen. That’s a bit worse than unpleasant,’ Alex remarks, as mildly as possible.

‘Yes.’ Laura frowns, as if thinking, and her next words are careful. ‘What happened with Maggie… He loved his kids, but he loved God’s word – his interpretation of God’s word, he loved that more. But he didn’t believe in the God _I_ know. He belived in sin, hellfire, all of that. Not in God. As religious as he claimed to be, Richard never grasped that God is loving, and full of forgiveness. Even enough for him,’ she adds wryly.

There’s not a great deal of space in Alex’s life for religion, and neither degrees in bioengineering nor a life spent fighting aliens mesh well with biblical literalism. She believes there’s something – more than this – but she doesn’t spend much time thinking about it. She can’t imagine what it would be like to live by that faith, in God, in prayer.

‘Is that why you took Maggie in? Because you believe in forgiveness?’

Laura has gone back to her crossword. Without looking up, she says, ‘I took Maggie in because I love her.’

A chickadee whistles from the back yard. There’s wind passing gently through the trees. Alex sips at her water. That could be it, the conversation over, but she decides to carry on. ‘You’re better than Bella at acting like you’re okay with it. With me.’

‘Alex, I have no issue with _you_ whatsoever,’ Laura corrects her. ‘You seem like a lovely girl.’ (That’s not a descriptor Alex can remember hearing applied to herself in a long time, if ever, and she’s sure it isn’t true.) ‘As for your relationship, your – your sexuality – I’m not pretending. I’m – trying.’ She shakes her head. ‘My faith has always told me that what you do is wrong, and if you don’t believe that you must be misguided. All of us suffer from temptation. God puts it there to test us.’

If anything was a test, it was the years Alex spent believing she was straight. It was the gauntlet Maggie faced growing up. That her love for Maggie now might be something she’s expected to resist? The thought is ludicrous.

‘Doesn’t God want us to be happy?’ she says.

‘Yes. That’s why I can’t follow my faith,’ says Laura, and Alex blinks in surprise. ‘When Maggie lived here, when she was too scared to be herself, she was miserable. I can’t believe that’s what God intended for her. I can’t look at the two of you, and see how much you care about her, and believe that’s something my God would condemn. But I – so many people, who know much more about this than me, would say I’m wrong for thinking like that. How can I argue with them? Am I a fool, trying to argue with God?’

Alex is trying to follow, but she’s lost the thread. Philosophy was never her strong point. Or is it theology? How can anyone be having an argument with God when God doesn’t argue back? Who knows what side he’d take?

Laura steeples her fingers together. ‘The thing I cling to,’ she says, ‘Is that if God forgives the things we do in bad faith, He will surely forgive honest mistakes.’

Daisy pads over and shoves her head into Alex’s lap. Alex gives the dog a scratch around the ears. ‘I see.’

‘Bella and Matthew, of course, are entitled to their own interpretation, even if they should try to be nice about it. As all of us should.’

Alex hears this with a sinking feeling. She’d already known Laura wouldn’t – no. Be nice? Hold your tongue, act like it doesn’t bother you, don’t get angry, don’t get upset: that’s what _nice_ means. Alex is already sick of playing nice. She’s sick of knowing it really is the best thing she can do right now.

She finishes the water, tang of steel on her tongue, murmurs something like agreement and excuses herself.

*

It’s a long day. All Alex hears from Maggie are a couple of messages around lunchtime, between the undertaker’s and other funeral arrangements. Hard to judge mood in a few lines of writing, but even so, they’re curt.

They come with a bubble of remorse. Maggie has more cause to be mad than Alex does.

When she runs out of halfway useful things to do she tries to distract herself with one of Bella’s crime novels, painfully inaccurate and with an ending as transparent as running water. At least there’s the garden to sit in. It’s not exactly relaxing. Alex isn’t sure if she feels better or worse when Laura does head out, to visit old friends: it’s a relief to be alone, but she’s acutely aware that it’s not her house. At least Laura is a _welcome_ guest.

She spends most of the day in an unsuccessful attempt not to wonder (worry) too much about how Maggie’s getting on.

They return shortly before dinner, Laura first, then the Sawyers. Bella promptly takes over the kitchen and sets her children to laying the table. She asks if there’s been any sign of Michael. Alex can’t tell her that: it’s not like she’s been answering the house phone, which has been ringing all day with – she assumes – predictable calls of condolence.

It transpires that none of the missed calls are from Bella’s wayward son. Alex is starting to wonder if Michael’s promised arrival isn’t a figment of Bella’s imagination.

Once she’s extricated herself from that conversation she goes to find Maggie, and pulls her into the living room to talk. ‘Look,’ she says, forcing herself. ‘I’m sorry about earlier. I know you don’t talk like that to people’s families. I know that’s not on.’

Maggie rubs her thumb across the back of Alex’s hand. ‘Thank you,’ she says. ‘So you’re not going to lose your temper again?’

‘I’ll try.’ Alex brushes Maggie’s hair from her face. ‘It’s not much longer. We’ll be out of here soon.’

‘Yeah. Soon.’

‘How was today?’

‘It went well. As well as you’d expect, I mean,’ Maggie says, and they sit on the bed, and she gives Alex a few details, the words spilling out for the sake of something to say. ‘Matthew’s still being an idiot but Mom was great.’

‘She didn’t give you any trouble?’

‘No. None.’

Funny, that Bella would suddenly be sweetness and light without Alex around. Really hilarious. Alex hums thoughtfully.

‘God, Danvers, anyone would think it was bad news,’ says Maggie, and there’s an edge in her voice. ‘Did you _want_ her to keep being a bitch?’

‘No. I’m just surprised.’ Concerned. But Maggie’s too smart to fall for that, isn’t she? And what does Bella hope to achieve?

At dinner she sits with her knee knocking against Maggie’s leg. They’re both quiet while the family bustles round them. To be honest, Alex wouldn’t have much to say anyway, and she tries to tell herself it’s only that; nothing to do with the cold knot between her ribs which tightens each time Bella Sawyer’s eyes slide over her.

Laura cheerfully regales them with updates on the friends she was visiting. (Tina Monaghan’s son wants to be an oncologist.) About halfway through the meal Alex sees her pour water into Bella’s wine glass. Laura notices her noticing and makes a guilty face, but now she’s on the lookout Alex catches her at it again later. She’s gone through a fair amount of the merlot herself, but the level in the bottle still depletes more slowly than last night; Bella’s cheeks don’t have the same spotted redness, and her eyes are less blurrily smudged.

They talk about the diner, Richard Sawyer’s pride and joy, and now his son Matthew’s responsibility. Half the small town’s been clamouring for reassurance it won’t close and Matthew, though he’s been working there since high school, sounds daunted at the challenge.

‘Dad did so much work running that place,’ he says, chasing drops of gravy around his plate with a chunk of bread. ‘I don’t know how to do half of what he did. I don’t know how I can keep it up.’

‘I’m sure your mom can lend a hand,’ Laura suggests.

‘I couldn’t possibly,’ says Bella, laughing like she’s turning down a favour rather than a burden. ‘I know you can handle it, can’t you, baby? Dad will be so proud of you for stepping up.’

‘Yeah,’ says Matthew. ‘Yeah, Mom, of course. I’ll figure it out.’

After Matthew leaves, Laura packs Bella off to bed. ‘It’ll be a long day tomorrow,’ she soothes, fingers tight around her sister’s cardiganed arm. ‘You need to get your beauty sleep. Come on, now.

It’s not late by Alex’s standards, though Maggie looks ready to turn in. They change in silence. When Alex gets back from cleaning her teeth, she finds her girlfriend staring into nothing. She hovers and Maggie notices, catches herself, and says, ‘Are you okay?’

‘What? Of course I am.’

‘Liar.’

Alex busies herself packing her washing things away, to make it easier to say – not quite to Maggie’s face – ‘I was worried about you. You left me here and I was worried about you.’

‘After what you said –’

‘I know, okay?’

Maggie glares at her. ‘You realise you never apologised, don’t you?’ She raises her hand before Alex can protest. ‘You said sorry to me. But you never said it to her.’

‘Well, how do you expect me to apologise to your mom when she treats me like I’m not there?’

The snarl in Alex’s own voice is enough to make her flinch. Or maybe it’s the way Maggie’s eyes shutter at the words, too loud, too sharp, and treading (again) over a line Alex has silently vowed not to cross. She says, ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to shout.’ She sits down next to Maggie and Maggie doesn’t move away when Alex touches her, but she doesn’t look at her either.

The washing bag lies half-packed.

‘I’m sorry.’

Maggie acknowledges it with a very slight nod.

From upstairs, Alex hears a door slam and a set of footsteps as either Bella or Laura – probably Laura – turns in. The dogs will be curled up on their blankets in the utility room. The pictures of Maggie and her brothers are dark pools on the grey walls, and all the furniture seems to loom.

‘I know she’s difficult. But getting angry at her won’t make her see reason.’

Alex holds her tongue on the question, _do you really think she’s going to?_ ‘Maggie. Why are you defending her?’ she asks instead, as gently as she can.

‘Because.’ Maggie shakes her head. ‘Because she didn’t throw me out. That was Dad, that was all him, and Mom, she – she was so _nice_ today. You don’t believe me, but she was, and she made Matthew shut up, and I can’t help thinking…’

‘What?’ Alex coaxes.

‘She doesn’t like me being gay, that’s not news, but she’s never had much of a chance to think anything else, and I can’t help hoping – maybe if she sees we’re just _us_ , not something _disgusting_ or _depraved_ , that we’re just you and me and we love each other –’ She hesitates again, and her final words are very quiet: ‘Maybe she’ll come around.’

‘Right,’ says Alex.

Maggie sighs. ‘You think I’m crazy, don’t you? You think that sounds crazy.’

‘I think you should prepare to be disappointed.’

Maggie looks more mutinous, Alex suspects, than if she’d simply agreed. That might have got her an argument. But Alex is too wrung out for an argument, and right now it could easily turn into a fight, which she definitely doesn’t want, considering it’s not her girlfriend she’s angry at. Or maybe it is. Alex can barely tell. She kisses Maggie, aiming for the cheek; Maggie allows it, then pulls away.

‘I need some fresh air.’ She must read something in Alex’s face, because she adds: ‘I’m not going anywhere, Danvers. I just want to take a minute.’

Alex watches her shrug her jacket on over her pyjamas and head through to the kitchen. It’s an oddly long time before the kitchen door thuds shut. When Maggie paces past the back window, Alex catches sight of a distinctive orange-blue flicker.

She doesn’t think Maggie’s smoked since her teens.

By the time Maggie returns, Alex is in bed. She can smell smoke on Maggie as she wordlessly crawls in behind Alex. It makes her think of college parties, dive bars, late-night bus stops shivering with rain.

Maggie keeps her distance. Alex reaches backwards to clutch at her hand.

*

The dream as Alex remembers it, before it thankfully fades into oblivion, involves a grocery store, one of her elementary-school teachers, a bad-tempered velociraptor and finally a waterfall pool which expands to match her steps when Alex tries to wade out of it. She wakes to the sound of distant traffic, dazed for a moment by the reality of bedsheets and dark but recovering quickly enough to realise she must have been woken. Alex doesn’t usually remember her dreams – only her nightmares – unless something’s startled her mid-sleep-cycle; and she has the shaky feeling in her limbs that indicates the same.

That’s not an ordinary Nebraska small-hours sound.

She’s drifted away from Maggie in the night. Alex reaches out to tap her on the thigh and receives a quiet noise of affirmation: Maggie’s already alert too. They slip out of the bed and move lightly towards the hall.

The scratches from behind the front door stop. Something clinks. There’s a huff of breath, then a voice, slow and swearing incoherently. Maggie holds up a hand to Alex.

‘Michael?’ she calls out.

A pause. Then, ‘Heyyy-there. Is that Mom?’

Alex _nearly_ manages not to laugh. Maggie glares at her. ‘I should leave you locked outside for that,’ she says.

Something thumps against the door – a fist, a shoulder – and Michael says, ‘Mags?’

When Maggie opens the door, her brother nearly topples inside. Maggie catches him. Alex takes a step forward, ready to help, but Maggie keeps them steady even when Michael swivels to wrap her in a wobbly bear hug.

‘Yeah, yeah, nice to see you too. What have you been drinking? Tequila?’

‘There mighta been some tequila in there,’ Michael admits. ‘Most’y jack.’

Maggie pulls them apart, keeping her hands on her brother’s shoulders. ‘I’ll bet.’ She looks him up and down. Sober, he’d look well-enough put together; it’s only the glazed expression and the twin scents of liquor and sweat that make him a painful sight.

Blinking around, Michael’s gaze falls on Alex. ‘Who’re you?’

‘I’m Alex.’

‘Michael, this is my girlfriend.’

‘You have a girlfriend? Why din’t you tell me?’ says Michael, surging forward to give Alex – no, not a hug – a surprisingly strong handshake. Maggie rolls her eyes and pulls him away, trying to aim her brother towards the stairs.

‘Because we haven’t spoken in almost a year,’ Maggie says under her breath. She hoists Michael’s arm around her shoulder and manages to drag him up a couple of steps. ‘Mom kept your bedroom for you. Let’s get you upstairs.’

‘Do you need a hand?’

‘No, I’m good. I’ve got you,’ Maggie adds to Michael, as he trips over one of the steps.

Unperturbed, he swivels his head round to call back to Alex, ‘Nice ta meet you, Maggie’s girl. She’s pretty, Mags,’ he adds to Maggie, in a whisper probably audible from Wyoming.

‘I know. And by the way, if you call me that name again, you’re coyote food.’

And they disappear up the stairs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hmph. Middles are always horrible to write. I'm on schedule this time but I may not be for the next chapter - next week's looking a bit intense, in rest-of-life terms.
> 
> Did you know leaving comments regularly is a proven deterrent against vampires?


	3. Not

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings for homophobia, emotional abuse, family death. And while we're at it, let's just say this chapter will justify the rating if the previous two didn't.

By mid-morning every surface in the kitchen is covered in trays, bowls, plates and reams of cellophane wrapping. Bella has taken it upon herself to provide a feast for the wake and apparently hasn’t stopped wrapping pigs in blankets since sunrise. She complains about doing everything by herself, loudly, while the others eat breakfast.

‘Would you like some help?’ Alex offers, once she’s washed up.

‘Can you cook?’ asks Bella.

‘I –’ She’s struggling to connect the question; _no_ or _not that well_ but she knows enough to be useful, and preparing trayfuls of canapes isn’t so much cooking in any case.

Bella scoffs. ‘Why am I not surprised?’

‘You know, Maggie’s a great cook,’ says Alex, levelling a stare at her. (It’s pointless: Bella has already turned away.)

‘Maggie won’t get her hands dirty,’ says Bella, indicating the sausages, and Alex gives up. She tried.

Maggie, currently, is talking to the dogs at the far end of the room. She rubs Daisy’s jaws between her hands, and the words drift over to Alex: ‘I didn’t hear a peep out of you last night. Not a peep. Some guard dogs you are.’ Alex can’t help smiling, listening in as Maggie continues – in the gooiest voice she’s ever heard from her girlfriend – with, ‘We could have been killed by intruders and you’d have slept right through it, yes you would have, yes you would have.’

Violet breaks free from the pampering and trots over to the table, where Michael starts feeding her bacon. He’s green-tinged, has only just been dragged out of bed, and is using one hand to shield his face against the morning light. It’s an inappropriately sunny day for a funeral. Or appropriate, considering.

‘Is there anything you’d like us to do?’ Alex asks.

‘Go and put the bed away if you’re so desperate to make yourself useful. Tidy up in there.’

Nobody’s talking much, at least not to each other. Bella’s drawn into herself: her greeting to Michael, upon finding he’d arrived, was exuberant but brief. Alex is acutely reminded that she doesn’t know, doesn’t know the family, doesn’t know if Bella would fuss over her older son like she does her younger under different circumstances – but the whole house feels caught up in an unsettled atmosphere she doesn’t think she’s imagining. It’s heavy and muted but there’s something prickly about it, something more taut than gloom and heartache, in the way the Sawyers are almost carefully ignoring each other.

Perhaps this is what it always feels like, on the days people bury fathers and husbands. Alex should know, she thinks, but that was different. She was sixteen and all she remembers is grief.

This doesn’t feel like _their_ grief. Or not just that.

Alex shakes herself. ‘Hey, babe, d’you want to help me with the bed?’ she calls to Maggie, and Maggie gives Daisy a final pat, points Violet back towards the utility room with a stern warning about begging, and comes with her.

It’s harder to put the bed away than it was to get it out: having been out, it seems to have decided it doesn’t want to go back, and the ease of catching fingers in corners suggest it was designed by someone with a sideline in torture devices. When they eventually win the wrestling match against the intractable fold-out, Alex offers Maggie a high-five. Maggie looks at her like she’s dropped her marbles into the sofa cavity along with the bed-frame.

‘Are you pissed with me, or just pissed?’ Alex says.

‘I’m not.’

‘Sure thing, Sawyer. You’re simply overflowing with goodwill.’ Alex pauses. ‘I don’t want to watch you deal with all this by yourself. It was hard enough yesterday. So if you’re going to be mad at me, can you please, just – be mad at me later?’

She keeps her hand up. With a flicker of a smile, Maggie takes the high-five.

Call it solidarity.

‘I’m not mad at you. Much.’

The bed’s only the start; the rest of the room still has to be put back together. Alex hoists armfuls of bedding up to Laura’s room and makes a return trip for their suitcases while Maggie replaces the sofa cushions. The carpet needs vacuumed, the ornaments need dusted. It takes a good five minutes to fluff out the pillows. They’re feeling quite proud of themselves until Bella swans past, nose held high, to give judgement.

‘I thought I said _tidy._ ’

‘Screw it,’ Maggie says once her mother’s footsteps fade, a picture of disarray in the geometrically-perfect room and the most beautiful thing in it. ‘I’m going for a shower.’

This leaves Alex at loose ends. She pokes her head into the dining room, its sideboards already strewn with napkins and paper plates, and finds Michael poking his head into the liquor cabinets.

It wouldn’t take DEO-trained stealth to get close to him. Alex leans against the wall, folding her arms. ‘Bit early for that, don’t you think?’

Michael jumps. ‘Christ. You’ll give a man a…’ Alex hears it just as Michael starts chuckling. ‘A heart attack. You’ll give a man a heart attack.’

‘Very funny. I’m not sure you should be drinking right now.’

Maggie’s brother unscrews a bottle of single malt and sniffs. ‘Trust me,’ he says, taking a swig, ‘Now’s not the time to try and make me sober up. Unless you’d like to see the prodigal son in alcohol withdrawal. You familiar with the DTs?’

‘They won’t hit until about Monday,’ says Alex.

‘You know that, do you?’ Michael says, with a grim laugh.

‘Not from personal experience.’ She sits at the head of the dining table. Leans back. Michael grins and offers Alex the bottle. Tempting. It looks like good whisky. But Alex, though she can’t boast the world’s healthiest relationship with alcohol, has never been a morning drinker. She waves it away.

‘Suit yourself,’ says Michael. This time, he knocks it back messily and starts coughing. Alex winces to see nice whisky disappear into the floor.

These are the things Alex knows about Maggie’s brother Michael. He’s two years younger than his sister and the designated smart one of the family; at twelve, watching his father kick his big sister out of the house (and they were close as children, partners in crime, particularly after Matthew came along), he was more than smart enough to recognise it for bigotry. He defied his parents to visit Maggie at her aunt’s and later, in his teens, earned his father’s wrath by derailing dinner-table conversations with talking points about Darwin and Dawkins. He went to Creighton, earned his JD, failed the bar exam and never got around to resitting it. Alex isn’t sure when the drink started to spiral in one direction and the rest of his life in another, because Maggie isn’t sure, because she lost track somewhere along the way; because by then Michael’s phone calls had already become few and far between. Nothing personal. Nobody else hears from him either.

Alex has never been a morning drinker. She wonders when she would have got around to it.

Michael raises the bottle again. ‘A toast to the old bastard,’ he says. And drinks.

* 

They take the dogs for a walk around Blue Springs to kill an hour. It’s the first time Alex has seen the town on foot, to be in rather than drive through. There’s not much to see. The houses, for all their individual architecture in their individual plots, start to look the same quickly enough. The shapes are different but they’re all built from the same material, with the same cars in the drives.

Alex has been homesick for Midvale most of her adult life. It’s the first time she’s felt homesick for National City. She wishes there were crowds to get lost in. Barely three hundred people live in Blue Springs and all of them, judging by the agog looks from car-washers and a handful of shadows in windows, remember what happened to Maggie Sawyer half a lifetime ago. Hell, Alex wouldn’t be surprised if nothing more exciting has happened here since.

She asks Maggie if she knows whether that’s the case.

‘Someone got arrested for punching out the Little League coach in ’09,’ says Maggie. ‘I think that’s it.’

They turn back.

Bella has been compelled to take a shower before she works herself into exhaustion, and Laura ushers them into the kitchen to finish preparing lunch. Alex wonders if they’ll all pretend the food materialised itself onto the dining room table. Michael’s still there, feet up on one of the chairs, until Laura makes warning noises. At least it’s the same bottle of whisky. (Laura removes it from his loose grip, shaking her head as she returns it to the cabinet. Michael aims her a winning smile: ‘Oh, Tia, can you pass me the rum?’) He grins lopsidedly when Matthew arrives.

‘Hey, little brother.’

Matthew stands stiffly. He looks spring-cleaned. Bella is right behind him, bedecked in heavy jewellery and mauve lipstick. ‘Nice of you to finally show up,’ says Matthew.

‘I’m glad to see you too. Look, the Sawyers are all here!’ He sweeps his hand across the table, almost knocking over a gold-painted candlestick. ‘Or at least what’s left of them.’

‘ _Michael_ ,’ Bella hisses.

She lights the candles, almost invisible against the sunshine pouring in through the windows. Their pointed tips soon melt into hollows of liquid wax that quiver along with the flames whenever the table shakes. Alex watches beads of the stuff slide over the edge. They decelerate down the sheer side and solidify about halfway to the base. The talk is about coffin-bearers, gravediggers and family plots. Bella worries over the turnout. She breaks into tears at this point, and the others share an embarrassed silence while Matthew rushes to comfort her.

‘We all miss him too, Mom.’

Maggie’s jaw clenches. Alex reaches for her hand under the table and thinks she feels her bones squeezed together under the sudden vice-like grip. Maggie notices. ‘Sorry,’ she mutters. Alex squeezes back.

Bella dabs her eyes and makes a series of small throat sounds, and the conversation is suddenly back on track. ‘How’s your speech, Matthew? Have you got that all prepared?’

Matthew pats his breast pocket. ‘I’ve got it right here, Mom. I just hope it does him justice.’

‘I’m sure it will.’ Bella folds the napkin away. She coughs again. ‘You know, I thought it would be nice if one of you two –’ She considers Michael, already a long way past tipsy, and turns to her daughter. ‘Maybe if you, Maggie, could say a few words as well.’

Alex is half-convinced she’s misheard. Maggie takes it better, manages to control herself (though Alex’s metacarpals creak again) and say warily, ‘Like what?’

‘Well – he was your dad. You could talk about happy memories, good times, how he raised you to be the won- to be the woman you are today,’ suggests Bella. ‘I know you had your differences, but you did love him, didn’t you?’

Maggie flinches. She nods slowly, frowning. ‘I did, but that’s not…’

‘You could apologise for how much you hurt him when you left,’ says Matthew, not close enough to under-his-breath to prevent everyone from hearing.

This makes Maggie snap. She rounds on her brother. ‘Excuse me? When I left? Like I got up and walked out? That’s not how I remember it,’ she says.

‘Maggie –’ says Laura.

‘No, Tia, it’s exactly the time. Is that what they told you happened? What would you know? You were _six._ I didn’t leave. Dad threw me out.’

‘Yeah, because you were a shameless dyke,’ Matthew retorts.

It’s a gut-punch. Maggie is quivering, in frustration, in rage, Alex can’t tell. She shoots Alex and warning glance and Alex clamps her teeth together and bites back her words.

Wax drips onto the tablecloth.

‘That’s enough, Matthew,’ says Bella. Matthew slumps in his seat. ‘And you, Maggie, you should know better than to speak ill of the dead.’

‘Sounds like simple facts to me,’ says Michael, veering across the table to reach for the wine bottle.

‘I’m amazed you can remember anything at all,’ his brother snipes.

Laura, who’s been trying to speak up since the start of the argument, finally gets a word in edgewise. ‘Now, everybody,’ she says, like someone soothing a skittish horse. ‘Remember, you’re a family. You need to support each other right now. Maybe we can all try a little harder to be nice to each other.’ She scans the table, raising her eyebrows at each of the Sawyers: Bella gives her a reluctant nod, Matthew looks suitably chastened, and Maggie stares at her plate.

(Alex is acutely aware she doesn’t belong here.)

Michael seems unperturbed by the warning. He downs his drink and laughs. ‘Family? This family’s a _joke._ You call this a family?’

And the candles burn. 

* 

They end lunch in brittle awkwardness, and quickly, but without further outbursts from anyone. Bella drags Michael into the living room and they can hear her putting him under sharp orders to behave himself. Maggie will not be speaking at the funeral – the subject quietly dropped – and Maggie rants under her breath about it while they change, in the room that is currently Laura’s but was once hers, into their funeral outfits.

Maggie looks down at her dress. Alex has been trying to remember why it’s familiar, and it clicks when her girlfriend says, ‘Remember I wore this to that fight club?’

‘Of course I remember. You told me to wear something nice, showed up looking gorgeous… and it wasn’t a date.’ Alex pulls Maggie’s hair out of the back of the cardigan, and reaches round to untangle a strand from one of the small, pearly buttons.

Maggie scoffs. ‘Please. When I take you on dates, you know about it.’

‘That’s very true,’ says Alex. She kisses Maggie on the back of the neck. Holds out her hand. ‘Shall we?’

The least-hostile driving arrangement, by unspoken agreement, puts Michael in their car on the way to the church. He’s in an ill-fitting suit – borrowed from Matthew, who is both shorter and heavier than his older brother – and smells overpoweringly of breath mints. Alex hustles him out of the car at the church door and Maggie goes to find a parking space. The church is quiet yet, clean white walls rising to arched pine beams, and a few early well-wishers scattered across the pews. Michael dips his hand in the marble font by the door and crosses himself.

The priest bustles over. He’s small, round, vanishing into his holy garments, and a smile splits his face as he greets Maggie’s brother. ‘Michael! It’s been a long time. A terribly sad occasion, of course.’

‘Yes, Canon Lynch. Very sad.’

Canon Lynch hums, immune to Michael’s sarcasm. ‘I’m so sorry for your loss. Your father will be greatly missed. And is this your… young lady?’

There’s at least four feet of clear space between Alex and Michael. It’s a logical leap to guess they’re even together, never mind _together._

Michael gets the correction in before Alex: ‘You’ve gotta be kidding. My girl wouldn’t come within a hundred miles of this dump. Alex here’s with Maggie.’

‘With Margaret – you mean, ah…’

‘Oh, don’t look so shocked. You watch lesbian porn, don’t you? You don’t? Hot women don’t do it for you?’

Canon Lynch splutters.

Alex says nothing, and shrugs helplessly at the priest. It’s not her job to make Maggie’s brother behave, now, is it? The canon backs away a few paces, then turns and flees as fast as dignity (and heavy robes) will allow.

‘We’re not a porn category, you know,’ says Alex.

Michael waves this comment away and reaches into his jacket pocket, to pull out – yes, there it is – a tartan hip flask.

Once Maggie arrives, and twines her fingers firmly around Alex’s, nobody else makes the same mistake. Bella marshals them by the door to greet incoming mourners, then promptly stumbles over the introductions: ‘You remember my daughter, of course, and her…’

‘Girlfriend,’ says Alex. After all, she’s faced down worse. Probably. Their eyes go wide, their jaws slack, and when they’ve moved further into the church she hears words trail back from the newcomers; words like _shameless_ and _imagine_ and _poor Isabela._ Bella glares at them, at their joined hands, her lips a disappearing line.

‘You couldn’t say you were – friends?’

‘You want me to lie? In a church?’ says Maggie.

Bella snorts. ‘Oh, go and keep your brother upright.’ No prizes for guessing which brother. Matthew has laid claim to the front bench on the other side of the aisle, hunched over, lips moving as he reads through his worn notes.

A middle-aged woman wearing a hat broad enough to serve as a manhole cover slides into the row behind and strikes up a surprisingly genial conversation about the weather in California. Alex is relieved she’s given Maggie an excuse not to look in the direction of the altar. For her own part, it’s a struggle not to go closer: to peer into the open casket, in its grove of cream and purple flowers, and the dead face within.

Laura returns from greeting her own son, who’s shown up for the day from Chicago. ‘Move up, Tina,’ she says, and the broad-hatted lady makes space for her. ‘You holding up, sweetheart?’

Maggie nods firmly. She’s wearing the same set expression Alex has seen on her – on everyone she works with – before heading into battle. Maybe it’s not so different. Here their armour is lipstick and kitten heels, and the price is not death but all the things they’ll have to live with. Wars fought and won in shame and pride. They’re outnumbered, deep in enemy territory, the focus of every eye in the hall; and though Maggie would bear the weight of public interest anyway as the dead man’s daughter, the undercurrent of the whispers is not sympathy or blessing.

Stand, sit, sing, pray. The canon leads the mourners in familiar rites. Matthew reads his speech without looking up from his notes, but his words are honest, ruminating on how much he’ll miss his dad and how hard it will be to step into his shoes. An uncle with more stage presence shares stories of their childhood to make even Bella laugh through her welling-up tears, and promises they will be reunited in the world to come.

Michael mutters under his breath a few times. Maggie stares fixedly ahead, above the canon and the altar, at the dying Christ pinned to the wall.

They bury Richard Sawyer in a green space lined with gleaming headstones, grey and silver, under a cornflower sky. By now high clouds are edging in at the horizon, looping ribbons of cirrus blown into dragons and leaping horses and as swiftly losing their form, and following them the cirrostratus haze to dim the afternoon sun. A breeze blows cooler air through the cemetery. Bella Sawyer clings to her son – her _good_ son – while her husband is lowered into the ground; something about ash, something about dust, that stupid poem about silent lands they always read at funerals.

The others move on. The stragglers go first, the ones who only came for the occasion, or out of a sense of duty. The second cousins and acquaintances. Then the friends, the close kin – Richard’s brother leading Bella away by a folded arm – and the priest. Michael empties the last drop of his flask onto the grey-brown soil and walks off in a good approximation of a straight line.

Maggie breathes out like a diver coming up for air.

Alex tucks a strand of hair behind her ears. ‘Feel any better?’

‘I don’t think so.’ She shakes her head. ‘I thought I’d be glad he’s dead. You know, there were times I wished he would just – does that make me a horrible person?’

Alex considers. ‘Did you mean it?’

‘Apparently not.’ Maggie laughs, a hollow sound rattling up from a deep well that fades to nothing in the wind. ‘I wanted him to be sorry. Not dead. I can’t yell at him if he’s dead.’

‘You could anyway. It might help.’ Alex gestures to the freshly-dug grave.

‘Excuse me?’

‘You might just be talking to a box, but your subconscious doesn’t need to know that.’

Maggie’s expression is the height of disdain. ‘I’m not talking to a corpse in a box, Alex.’ Alex sees her tense – maybe she heard herself – then Maggie gives herself a shake and says, ‘Come on. My mom will want help back at the house.’ 

* 

The house is full of people in black. Maggie’s dad might not have been universally well-loved, but he was a respected and familiar figure in Blue Springs-and-Wymore, and he had a substantial extended family to contend with. Maggie points out several people as cousins on the way to collect food.

Many of the guests cluster around Bella, dripping with condolences, but Maggie is a focus of attention too. A few people have dropped their polite, distant curiosity in favour of directly interrogating her with the kind of questions that would make a kindergartener frustrated. ‘Are you still a lesbian, then?’ is followed by, ‘But you have long hair,’ which leads into, ‘But what if you want kids?’ and finally, ‘I’m sure you’ll find the right man someday.’

‘I’m standing right here,’ says Alex, once that particular idiot has wandered off.

Maggie groans. ‘Trust me, babe. She was one of the nice ones,’ she mutters.

With Bella too busy being comforted, it’s fallen on Laura to keep the drinks flowing and the canape tables stocked. She quickly drafts them into waitressing duties. It’s a relief, honestly – it gives Alex something to do with her hands and a way to move around the house without being expected to hold conversation – but it means she loses track of Maggie for a while.

The living room has fallen to hush when Alex enters. Attention is on a bearded man by the television, who stands with his glass raised and coughs a couple of times to draw the eyes of the few people still talking. ‘If you don’t mind, Isabela,’ he says, and Bella simpers as heads turn towards her. ‘I would like to make a toast.’

Alex hovers by the door with her tray. She eats a couple of miniature tarts, scanning the room for her girlfriend. There. Maggie’s perched on the arm of the sofa beside Matthew, fingers twisting round the edge of an empty wine glass.

‘As I’m sure you all know, Richard and I have been – _were_ friends from the beginning of elementary school…’

His chest swells with emotion as he extols Richard Sawyer’s virtues. So he claims, Richard was a great man and a good one, kind, generous, faithful to his work: ‘Truly a pillar of the community,’ he says, lifting his glass higher, and this is when Maggie stands up. A few people must notice the movement but she’s in a corner of the room and she slips along the wall fairly unobtrusively. Only when she brushes past can Alex see the extent of her anger, cold, written across her face.

She dumps the canapes and follows Maggie to the kitchen.

It’s empty. Once the door closes the wake feels far away, despite its debris scattered around them. Maggie lifts a champagne glass and half-drains it in one go.

‘Babe? Talk to me.’

‘How _wonderful_ he was,’ Maggie snarls. ‘That’s all anyone can say. Have you heard them? Pillar of the goddamn community.’

‘It’s a wake, Maggie. People aren’t going to start…’

‘No, no, that’s the thing.’ There goes the rest of the champagne. ‘They all _mean_ it. To them, he was wonderful. They’re going to _miss_ him.’ Maggie puts down the glass and it shivers, tilts for a moment before settling. She grips the edge of the counter. ‘I guess anyone who doesn’t think the sun shone out of his – anyone else isn’t going to show up. Except me and Michael. But we’re the idiots who had him for a dad.’

Alex doesn’t have an answer for that. Or doesn’t need one. Better to let Maggie have her say.

‘You know what people have been saying to me? You know, two people told me point-blank I should be ashamed to show my face here.’ Maggie’s voice is low, pitched not to carry through the house, and that somehow concentrates her fury more than shouting would. ‘I have _nothing_ to be ashamed of.’

Alex steps forward, close enough to reach for Maggie’s arm. ‘No, you don’t.’

Some of the tension goes out of Maggie; not much. ‘I wish I could –’ She makes a jagged motion with her hands, frustrated.

‘Me too. But babe, we’re so close to reaching the end of this. At the risk of sounding like a hypocrite –’ Maggie snorts. ‘– You just need to hold it in for a few more hours.’

‘A few more hours,’ Maggie echoes, like Alex has told her she _just_ needs to climb a mountain and swim the Pacific ocean.

‘A few more hours, yeah, and tomorrow we’ll be home. Okay?’

‘Right. Yeah.’ Alex sees Maggie look around the kitchen, at the trays and the dishes. She wonders if her girlfriend recognises it as Bella’s work, if she thinks of that, because Alex is fairly certain Bella is the only reason Maggie hasn’t knocked anyone’s teeth out yet. ‘Yeah.’ She’s composed herself, restrained, getting ready to go back out.

Alex leans in to kiss her, aiming for the cheek, but meeting Maggie’s lips instead, which is not a development she’s liable to complain about. She can taste champagne and desire. It’s tempting to deepen the kiss – they’re alone – and her hand strays instinctively to Maggie’s back; but she pulls away and rests her forehead against Maggie’s. ‘I love you.’

‘I love you too, Danvers.’

A second, brief kiss, and it’s back to the battlefield.

They almost make it.

Half an hour later Alex finds herself talking to Laura and a couple of her friends about the price of Canadian oil – of all things – with her hand brushing against the edge of Maggie’s. A few people have cleared out, making it easier to breathe, though it’s still a busy event. When Maggie stiffens, Alex tunes out of the discussion and immediately realises what she’s picked up on: Bella’s voice, audible through the ajar kitchen door.

‘… Going to. You know she’s always had a rebellious streak.’ Her companion’s voice is more muffled, and Alex can’t make out what he says in response. It sounds like a question. Bella’s answer rings clear: ‘Yes, bringing that little hussy here was taking it a bit far.’

Well, that stings.

Maggie’s expression goes from hurt to livid in a heartbeat’s space. She grabs Alex’s hand and practically drags her from the chair. ‘Fuck this,’ she says quietly. ‘Fuck all of this.’ No, Alex thinks, as the words click into place in her head, through the fog of maybe-I-shouldn’t-have-drunk-so-much, actually, it more than stings. Actually, it feels like someone just landed a punch to her sternum, or took hold of her heart and squeezed. Where are they going? Up the stairs, past smiling family portraits boxed in by stained wood, tripping, and there’s nobody up here, and Maggie kisses her, hard.

Alex lurches into it; feels Maggie’s jaw under her fingertips, her fingers snaking up Alex’s dress. It’s sharp and desperate and they both gasp when they pull loose, and Maggie says, ‘She’s wrong.’

It’s an effort to think of words. ‘I know.’

But that’s not enough to prove it.

Alex looks at her girlfriend, proud and beautiful, smiling in grim determination. A corner of her mind whispers that this is a bad idea, but it’s overwhelmed by the rising fury, by the need to show – to her own satisfaction – what they mean to each other; what everyone here thinks is impossible. And the desperate desire for skin on skin, for release, without fear or in defiance of it. Bella Sawyer already thinks the worst of her.

She lets Maggie draw her into the bathroom and push her up against the door. The lock clicks under Alex’s skittering fingers.

They are not a child’s rebellion. They are nothing to be ashamed of. And Alex is not a – or in that case she _will_ be, and screw them. Most importantly, Maggie doesn’t think so either: because if Alex can ever understand what any human beside herself is thinking, she understands that Maggie’s whispered oaths of love and righteous anger are true. She swallows back a moan as Maggie’s lips trace up her neck to murmur in her ear, ‘Fuck me, Danvers. Now.’

‘Yes,’ says Alex, and lifts Maggie by the thighs to settle her against the white porcelain sink. Maggie’s arms stay twined around Alex’s neck and her teeth bite into Alex’s shoulder while Alex draws spirals up Maggie’s legs. Her panties vanish in the direction of the shower. Alex gives encouragement with all the dirtiest things she knows Maggie likes to hear, and soon Maggie has her head tossed back, flushed, breathing heavily –

The door swings open –

The lock; it jams; Alex had forgotten –

And Alex freezes with her hand up Maggie’s dress under her uncle’s shocked gaze.

*

Bella waits until the guests have gone to tear into them.

The wake’s mercifully close to its natural end, and if a cold-eyed Bella Sawyer hurries it along, well, nobody’s complaining with _that_ story to take home. Alex and Maggie wait out the remainder in the kitchen: Alex paces, and Maggie sits with her head in her hands at the scratched table. Words like, ‘Oh my god,’ and ‘What were we thinking?’ escape the shelter of her arms.

Daisy rests her head on Maggie’s lap. She flees in a clatter of paws when Bella enters, and Alex sits down beside Maggie instead. They’re the only ones left: them, and Michael, and Laura berating him in the living room.

‘Oh, the world’s spinning, is it? Then you’d better stay put,’ Laura says through the wall.

Bella puffs herself up, gathering in air, and proceeds to do something worse than shout. She cries.

‘What have I ever done to deserve this, Maggie?’ she says. ‘Carrying on like that at your own father’s funeral – I’ve never been so humiliated in my life. Don’t you care? Didn’t you love him?’

The world seems to dilate, then shrink again. Alex’s head is still fuzzy from champagne. They were drunk; were they drunk? Drunk they were. But. They weren’t doing it to make a scene. That’s what always happens: the reason you do something means nothing to the people who don’t like it so it disappears entirely, and suddenly you’re lightning striking the innocent at random.

There’s a clock ticking, loudly, incessantly, too slow. Flies buzzing around plates of food by the window. A frame catches Alex’s eye, by the door, emblazoned with one of those twee quotes. Something about family.

She hears Maggie saying, from a great distance, ‘Mom, of course I –’

‘I’m a good person. I’m a good mother. Now I’m going to be the pity of the whole goddamn town!’

‘Mom. I’m sorry.’

Maggie shouldn’t be sorry. Maggie shouldn’t be _this_ sorry about anything, ever. Alex firmly believes there’s nothing so wrong she could do. But okay – they did screw up. Don’t have sex at a funeral. That’s a life rule so basic, so obvious, they don’t even bother to put it on the list. Don’t have sex at your dad’s funeral.

How about, don’t tell people your daughter is claiming to be gay for the attention? Is that on the list? Has Bella ever read it?

‘Sorry? Clearly you’re not sorry.’ She gestures to the two of them. ‘Haven’t I been punished enough? Was I such a terrible mother?’

‘No, Mom, you weren’t –’

‘Then why are you so determined to hurt me, Maggie? Why do you behave like this? I didn’t raise you to –’

Suddenly Alex finds her tongue. ‘Will you shut up?’ she snaps.

Her words are greeted, understandably, with the silence of interstellar space.

‘Excuse me?’ says Bella after a shocked moment, and Alex doesn’t flinch because that moment has given her time to herd her thoughts together and:

‘You didn’t raise her. You threw her out when she was fourteen. That’s not fucking raising her. People who love their kids don’t let them get thrown out.’

She hears Maggie breathe in sharply. But she’s not telling Alex to stop. Alex doesn’t know if she could. The anger in her veins has passed through burning pitch to reach ice again. Nobody has the right to speak to Maggie like that. Not even her mother. _Especially_ her.

‘You’re telling me I don’t love my own daughter? Who do you think you are?’

Alex could write several dissertations on that question and she’d still be mostly wrong, so she neglects it. Oh, well. Go big or go home. She’s past caring about the consequences of her words and there’s a fierce freedom in that, so she says, ‘You love the version of Maggie you wanted and not the one you got.’

‘Coming into my home with your big-city attitude –’ Bella continues.

If she’s going to barrel past everything Alex says, then Alex will do the same. ‘Who is smart and kind and wonderful but you can’t see that because you think she’s trying to hurt you for – what? Not being a perfect mother? Because she feels like it? Maggie’s a better person than that and you clearly don’t care about how much this hurts _her_.’

Maggie’s nails are going to leave crescent moons in her palm. But she’s still. Not. Telling Alex to stop.

Only she does have to stop now, because she can’t think what else to say.

‘Are you saying me I don’t know my own daughter?’ Bella advances on them. ‘I know she’s ungrateful. I know she’s selfish. I know she brought _you_ here without asking and expected us all to dance around pretending it was all hunky-dory.’ She’s wrung more tears from nowhere. Bella is building up steam while Alex feels like she’s run out of it, like she’s run up against a brick wall. There must be words to counter Bella’s, to reveal them for lies, that’s not what happened, or it is but it wasn’t like that – she’s said that already. She thinks she has. Does this woman never _listen_? ‘I suppose that doesn’t bother you, seeing the perversions they tolerate out where you’re from. Letting boys dress up like girls and telling us we have to let your lot get married like it’s not sickening. I know what you are and I know what you’ve lured my Maggie into –’

Alex bites her lip, clinging to Maggie’s hand under the table, and at least, at least, if Bella Sawyer’s rage falls on her, it’s not falling on Maggie. Bella can do less to Alex. She’s not _her_ mother.

A new voice says, ‘That’s enough, Bella.’

Laura has entered the kitchen. She’s tired, pale, but her voice is steady and quiet and cuts through her sister’s fury like shards of glass through skin.

Bella falls silent for a second. Then she hisses, ‘I don’t see how it’s any of your concern.’

‘No? Isn’t she my niece?’ Laura pulls herself up tall. She is perfectly calm. ‘Didn’t I give her a home for three years, when you neglected to? Don’t I love her? Don’t I have a right to protect her from your bullying?’

The word drops like a stone.

Bella says, ‘Don’t be so ridiculous.’ It rings as hollow as a lightning-struck tree. She stammers over whatever incoherent thing it is she tries to say next, and gives up.

Laura has closed the distance on her sister. Bella takes a step back. Laura says, ‘You’re a disgrace. You’re a fool and a coward and you have no heart. Mama and Papa would be ashamed.’

‘You’re going to drag them into it?’ Bella retorts.

‘Look at your daughter. _Look_ at her. You remember the day she was born? Her first day at school? Now you’re going to say such things to your own daughter? She loves that girl and Alex loves her and you’re a blind woman if you can’t see it. But then you never could see much outside yourself, could you, _Senora_ Sawyer?’

Bella looks. Glances. Glares out the window. Laura says, ‘I think we’re done here,’ and Bella sweeps out of the room – a less generous interpretation might call it fleeing.

‘Thank you,’ says Alex. She’s reeling. Whiplash. Is it over?

Laura smiles sadly. She takes the last remaining clean glass from the cupboard and fills it with water, and carries it back through to Michael. Maggie curls in towards Alex, breath starting to hitch, and Alex instinctively nestles around her, and understands.

* 

‘I’m sorry.’ That’s the first thing. They’re in the back yard, huddled together on the bench, under the gathering clouds. It doesn’t feel like rain, just low and grey. The yellow heads of the roses are bobbing in the wind. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have lost my temper again. Are you mad?’

Maggie shakes her head, utterly defeated. ‘There’s no point.’ She doesn’t mean, in getting mad at Alex. She means – everything, perhaps: ‘It was stupid. But no, Alex, I’m not mad. I can’t…’

She’s folding again. ‘Okay. Shh. I got you.’ What is there to say, what is there to do? There’s no way for Bella to take her words back, in the unlikely event she wanted to – and oh, Alex hates being right. Right isn’t worth having someone she loves fall apart in her arms. Usually Maggie tears up and tears into people at the same time.

Right now, she seems barely capable of crying. She rubs angrily at her eyes. ‘I hate this,’ she says. ‘I hate that she can still get to me. It’s not even _about_ her.’

‘Then what’s it about?’

‘I.’

A chickadee trills from one of the trees.

‘I miss my dad,’ she says, and then the tears come, in hushed, hiccuping sobs. Alex pulls Maggie in and the rest of her words are addressed to the stained fabric of Alex’s dress. When she gets herself under enough control to speak rather than simply choking words out, Maggie continues: ‘I think part of me always thought one day we’d make up and now.’

‘Now he’s dead,’ Alex finishes.

‘No, babe, now I realise it was a fucking fantasy. He was never going to change. _She’s_ never going to change.’ Maggie pauses. ‘But I still miss him so much and I wish I could stop.’

‘I know.’

‘He’s never coming back. You know why he’s never coming back? Not because he’s dead. Because he _never existed._ The man I thought was my dad, he was just someone I dreamed up, because I was a stupid kid and I couldn’t see the real Richard Sawyer.’ She laughs, and it sounds like shards of ice. ‘And you know what? He might have been a terrible person but at least he had the integrity to disown me to my face. I always thought it was him, I thought it was all him. Fuck.’

Alex strokes her hair.

Maggie says, ‘And the really pathetic, pitiful thing is, I still want her to – if she said – I feel so fucking useless, Alex.’ She turns to rest her head against Alex’s chest. ‘I shouldn’t need you and Laura to stand up for me. I’m a cop.’

‘And a total badass,’ says Alex. ‘But even you need help sometimes, Sawyer.’

Maggie grumbles at that. ‘Selfish of me to drag you into my own family problems –’

‘Hey. I came of my own free will.’ And Alex would do it again, knowing what it means walking into.

‘I’m not sure it’s much of a family, anyway,’ Maggie murmurs. ‘Not sure it ever was.’

What is there to say? Only the old words of reassurance. I’ve got you. I’m here. I love you. Until Maggie’s breath settles to something less ragged, until Alex lets the words pass into silence, and they hold each other, still, under the gathering clouds.

Movement. Alex glances up and sees Michael on the back porch. He’s found himself another drink. He drains his glass, raises it to Alex, and walks unsteadily away.

*

After a while they dry their eyes. It might come welling back up later; but there’s only so long a person can cry for, and the garden is beautiful. Alex counts down the hours and minutes and whispers them to Maggie, who smiles.

That’s how Laura finds them. She says, ‘Your mother’s upstairs sulking. Don’t think I’ll get any sense into her. Come on. How about I take you two out of here for a bit?’

‘Where?’ says Maggie.

‘Oh, we’ll find something to eat – how about that pizza place you always liked? Up you get, now.’

Maggie’s response is less than enthusiastic, but she does get up, and Alex follows. Laura snags a set of keys from the counter. Alex only realises what that means when she clicks them on the front drive, and the Sawyers’ car beeps.

‘We’ve got a car,’ says Alex, indicating their rental.

Laura shrugs. ‘Bella’s is nicer. Do either of you want the front seat? No?’

Beatrice is a blessed change from Blue Springs. It’s not that the people are necessarily very different – Alex doesn’t think holding Maggie’s hand in public would be a better idea here than in her hometown, and hell, they do that rarely enough in National City – and the buildings are of a familiar spacious, rural design, but it’s at least big enough for nobody to worry about the appearance of strangers. Blue Springs has a post office – Beatrice has a community college and a water park. The main street almost feels bustling.

It’s not very good pizza.

Laura says, ‘In all this, I’ve never had a chance to get to know you properly.’ Alex isn’t convinced that’s true, but she takes the bait, and tells Laura about bioengineering and Kara and motorbikes. By the time they’re down to crusts, Maggie has brightened enough to join in, teasing Alex about how easily scared she is by healthy food (“Kale is not healthy, Sawyer, it’s horrific”) and her fashion sense (“You know who has that much plaid in their wardrobe, Danvers? Lumberjacks and lesbians”). If Laura is taken aback by that last comment, she doesn’t let it show, and Maggie’s almost challenging remark whistles past her.

When Maggie tries again, it’s more deliberate. ‘She wore one to Pride – you know Pride, Tia? National City throws one of the best Pride parades. You couldn’t move for rainbows.’

Laura shrugs and gathers in the crusts. ‘That’s nice.’

‘I thought you disapproved of my _lifestyle_ , Tia. Why are you suddenly acting like you’re on our side?’

Laura gives Maggie a steady look, and wipes her hands on a napkin. ‘I’ve always been on your side, sweetheart.’

‘No, you’re on the side of sit down and be quiet. How long did you let her have a go at us for?’

‘Your mother’s her own woman, Maggie,’ says Laura. ‘I’m not her keeper. And you know fine well your behaviour was out of line. She had every right to give you a telling-off. What compelled you?’

‘Because she – oh. You didn’t hear what she said at the wake. What she called Alex.’ Maggie glares. ‘ _She_ heard, and you were talking to her. Or have you gone deaf all of a sudden?’

‘Selectively, I confess. There are a lot of things I haven’t wanted to hear,’ Laura replies. The tiredness is back – or rather, Alex thinks, it never went away. It’s almost an apology. Maggie deflates. She reaches across the plastic table and takes Laura’s hand.

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t be. I suppose I deserve it. But don’t mind me. I’m a silly old woman.’

‘You’re not old!’ Maggie protests, and the mood breaks like a popping bubble. They wave the waiter over for the dessert menu, laminated double-sides bearing fuzzy pictures of ice cream. Maggie complains about the impossibility of finding vegan ice cream in restaurants.

‘That’s because you’re the only person in a hundred miles who actually likes it, babe,’ says Alex. Maggie huffs and slaps her knee.

Laura smirks. ‘Ah, to be young and in love.’

‘I said already, Tia, you’re not old.’

‘Ha. Don’t talk to your cousins. Amy’s been trying to sign me up for online dating and Hugo thinks I should join a tai chi class.’

Maggie wrinkles her nose. ‘Tai chi? No, definitely yoga. Yoga is much better.’

‘You’ll have to take it up with Hugo,’ Laura says. From there they meander through a conversation about Maggie’s cousins, who Alex has never met and knows little about, though Maggie is on better terms with both of Laura’s kids than her own siblings. Alex does the math and realises Laura must have been Kara’s age, or younger, when she had them; apparently Amy is old enough to have a daughter of her own, kindergarten-aged, who insists on dressing up like Supergirl. (Alex pretends it was her soda she choked on.) The drive back is dominated by a lively argument over music stations. The Other Things have been laid in a corner for the moment and, much as it still feels like there’s plenty to resolve, maybe it’s best to let them rest for now.

Alex isn’t sure Laura’s concessions are worthy of gratitude. She is grateful nonetheless. And she’s not alone in that. ‘Thank you for dinner,’ Maggie says, when they get back to the house.

‘It’s really the least I could do.’

She’s right, Alex thinks. It really is.

* 

Laura vanishes to yank, ‘Whatever whisky or gin bottle he’s found this time,’ from Michael’s hands. Maggie and Alex bring their cases and bedding down from her room, and while away some time clearing up the food and other wreckage from earlier in mostly-companionable silence. It’s early even by Maggie’s standards when they go to make the bed up again (but they’ll be leaving in the middle of the night, so should catch what rest they can). They’re interrupted only halfway into the job.

‘Hey,’ says Michael from the doorway. He’s back to the clothes he arrived in, hands slung in his pockets, passably sober. ‘I’m heading off.’

‘So soon?’

He grins. ‘So, like. You don’t need to bother with that. You can have my room.’

Maggie looks at her brother, at the half-unfolded bed, at her brother again. ‘ _Really_ ,’ she says. Then she goes and gives him a hug. ‘You’re useless, you know that?’

‘I love you too, Mags.’

‘Seriously. I’m a cop. Have you no respect?’

Michael pretends to think about it. ‘No. None.’ He offers Alex a salute, and she nods in return, half-smiling, half-thinking about the imminent need to wrestle the sofa-bed back into place. ‘We must catch up more,’ Michael adds to Maggie.

‘My apartment’s not a free hotel, you know.’

‘Damn. My cunning plan is foiled.’ He leaves her with a final quick squeeze. He must have already said his farewells to his mother and aunt; soon afterwards they hear the front door slam. Maggie looks at the bed and snorts.

They get it away with all their fingers intact and traipse everything back upstairs. Maggie goes looking for Laura and returns shaking her head: it seems her aunt has taken the dogs for a walk in what’s left of the fading daylight, and there’s no telling how long she’ll be. Alex and Maggie both want to get to bed, and after a brief back-and-forth they decide not to wait up for her.

It’s not sleep they’re in a hurry for. They have business unfinished to attend to. Alex recalls the fervency of earlier and some of it rises again, but for the most part they are gentle, intense but unhurried. The marks they leave on each other’s skin, under the collarbone, inside the thigh, spell out _mine._ When finally sated they lie in a tangled heap taking up only a portion of the bed. Maggie is a soft weight, warm, her hair threatening to drift into Alex’s mouth.

‘Never thought I’d be having sex in my little brothers’ room,’ Maggie says.

Alex chokes. ‘Seriously, babe?’ Then she thinks. ‘Did Matthew share?’

‘Yeah. He moved into mine after I got thrown out,’ says Maggie, in a tone easy to mistake for breezy. Alex kisses her shoulder.

‘They used to have stars on the ceiling. You remember, those glow-in-the-dark ones? I guess Michael grew out of them.’ She frowns up at the ceiling for a moment longer, then turns and yawns into Alex’s neck.

It’s near enough time for them to think about moving. Alex talks to keep Maggie awake, because she’ll be bad-tempered if she needs to be roused from drowsiness. After a while, reluctantly, they abandon the warmth of the bed and track down their clothes.

Maggie is ready first, and sits cross-legged at the end of the bed, deep in thought. Alex pulls her suitcase to the door. She says, ‘Have you decided?’

‘Yeah.’ Maggie nods. ‘There’s no point in talking to her, is there?’

Alex spreads her hands.

‘If I let her start she won’t stop and she’ll make me feel guilty again and – the worst part is I know what she’s doing, but I still can’t fight it. Can’t argue with her. So I think I need to just… walk away.’

She looks at Alex as if for confirmation. But that’s something Alex can’t give her. She smiles as tenderly as she can, and Maggie gathers herself.

‘Okay. Time to say goodbye.’

They slip into the hallway. Maggie heads down the corridor and knocks apologetically on a door. There’s no answer until she knocks again, louder, and Laura finally pulls it ajar.

‘What in – oh. You’re heading off.’

‘Yeah,’ says Maggie, shuffling from foot to foot. Laura gives up on clutching her dressing gown closed and embraces her.

‘You’re a good girl, sweetheart. Remember to keep in touch.’

‘Thank you, Tia,’ Maggie murmurs. ‘Can you – can you say goodbye to Mom for me? She knows we’re leaving tonight.’

‘You don’t want to say it yourself?’

‘No.’ Maggie hesitates, then says more firmly, ‘No. She still wants me to apologise, for – _me_ , for _us._ ’ A sweep of her hand includes Alex in the _us._ ‘If one day she realises that – maybe she’s the one who should be apologising to me – then I’ll listen. But until then I don’t think we’re going to have much to say to each other.’

Alex says goodbye to Laura, who replies with a genuine smile. They tiptoe down the stairs and whisper farewell to the dogs, who wake at their approach, tails wagging and brown eyes blinking in the dark. Daisy has claimed Richard’s shoe for her own. Violet snuffles at their faces. Maggie tells them to be good.

‘By which I mean, give her hell,’ she clarifies, speaking seriously into Daisy’s soft gaze, and Alex thinks she won’t move left to her own devices, so she taps Maggie on the shoulder and leads her away.

* 

And so, at the witching hour, they pack their things into the hire car and leave Blue Springs behind. Once its yellow lights fade from view they travel in darkness, black and grey, fluid and soon forgotten. It is not a place. It is a place between places, to enter from one world and emerge into another.

They stop once, somewhere near the threshold between here and there, when Maggie’s town and Maggie’s childhood are half an hour and half a lifetime away. Then they carry on. Tomorrow they will be home and Alex will forget it’s possible to think like this. They might argue. They might kiss. Kara will come with doughnuts and condolences. They’ll talk about getting a dog.

Alex puts the radio on for the remainder of the drive.

They cross state lines. Maggie sleeps and Alex decides not to wake her for her turn driving. The fields give way to small towns, springing up on the plains like mushrooms, thicker in density closer to the nucleus of Kansas City. There are shadows on the eastern horizon by the time it rounds into view. There are the lights of civilisation, blazing with colour. Soon another set of lights will spread below them, marking out the familiar streets and well-worn landmarks of National City. Home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I'm posting this at 7am for… Reasons.
> 
> Anyway. This was always the plan, so I hope nobody hates how I've wrapped things up. Thank you to all my lovely readers. I'm gonna go write something reasonably fluffy now before I give myself an existential crisis.
> 
>  
> 
> _Get more fic from your favourite authors with this one simple trick: commenting! ___

**Author's Note:**

> Once again, a case of, "I don't think I'm really happy with this but I can't figure out how to make it better so let's see what you all make of it." (It actually didn't end up quite as dark as I was expecting.)
> 
> I can't _believe _I wrote this during Pride month. It's way too much of a downer for Pride.__
> 
>  
> 
> __  
> _And by the way, have you read _Zen and the Art of Commenting _?___  
> 


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